they say that
they do it themselves rightwise and the Hellenes leftwise: and they use
two kinds of characters for writing, of which the one kind is called
sacred and the other common.

They are religious excessively beyond all other men, and with regard to
this they have customs as follows:--they drink from cups of bronze and
rinse them out every day, and not some only do this but all: they wear
garments of linen always newly washed, and this they make a special
point of practice: they circumcise themselves for the sake of
cleanliness, preferring to be clean rather than comely. The priests
shave themselves all over their body every other day, so that no lice or
any other foul thing may come to be upon them when they minister to
the gods; and the priests wear garments of linen only and sandals of
papyrus, and any other garment they may not take nor other sandals;
these wash themselves in cold water twice in a day and twice again in
the night; and other religious services they perform (one may almost
say) of infinite number. They enjoy also good things not a few, for they
do not consume or spend anything of their own substance, but there is
sacred bread baked for them and they have each great quantity of flesh
of oxen and geese coming in to them each day, and also wine of grapes is
given to them; but it is not permitted to them to taste of fish: beans
moreover the Egyptians do not at all sow in their land, and those which
they grow they neither eat raw nor boil for food; nay the priests do not
endure even to look upon them, thinking this to be an unclean kind of
pulse: and there is not one priest only for each of the gods but many,
and of them one is chief-priest, and whenever a priest dies his son is
appointed to his place.

The males of the ox kind they consider to belong to Epaphos, and on
account of him they test them in the following manner:--If the priest
sees one single black hair upon the beast he counts it not clean for
sacrifice; and one of the priests who is appointed for the purpose makes
investigation of these matters, both when the beast is standing upright
and when it is lying on its back, drawing out its tongue moreover, to
see if it is clean in respect of the appointed signs, which I shall tell
of in another part of the history: he looks also at the hairs of the
tail to see if it has them growing in a natural manner; and if it
be clean in respect of all these things, he marks it with a piece of
papyrus,